An unexpected cooling effect in Saturn’s upper atmosphere

C. G. A. Smith, A. D. Aylward (), G. H. Millward, S. Miller and L. E. Moore
Additional contact information
C. G. A. Smith: University College
A. D. Aylward: University College
G. H. Millward: University College
S. Miller: University College
L. E. Moore: Boston University

Nature, 2007, vol. 445, issue 7126, 399-401

Abstract: Saturn's hidden power The four Solar System giants are too hot. That is, their upper-atmosphere temperatures are higher than predicted by their absorption of sunlight. The favoured explanation is that the 'missing' heat is injected by the magnetosphere in the planets' polar regions, and redistributed globally by winds. A new study rules this out. Smith et al. report that the net effect of the winds driven by polar energy inputs on Saturn is not to heat but to cool the atmosphere. This surprising result will stimulate a search for an unknown source of polar energy, or for some other process that heats low latitudes directly.

Date: 2007
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature05518 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:nature:v:445:y:2007:i:7126:d:10.1038_nature05518

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/

DOI: 10.1038/nature05518

Access Statistics for this article

Nature is currently edited by Magdalena Skipper

More articles in Nature from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().